To the Editor:

Re "Planning for Terror but Failing to Act" (front page, Dec. 30):

Last May, Louis J. Freeh, then the director of the F.B.I., testified before
Congress on the nature of global terrorism and the bureau's actions to
prevent it. Mr. Freeh asked for only eight additional agents to combat
terrorism. During the last few years, Congress has increased the number of
Drug Enforcement Agency personnel by 26 percent while adding only 2 percent
to the F.B.I.

The magnitude of the country's drug problem remains undiminished. On the
other hand, if the F.B.I.'s paltry 11,500 agents (New York City has 40,000
police officers) had been expanded by 26 percent to work against terrorism,
the many federal blunders that permitted a devastating act of war against
our country most likely would have been avoided.

JOSEPH D. MCNAMARA, Stanford, Calif., Dec. 31, 2001

The writer, a retired police chief of San Jose, Calif., is a research
fellow at the Hoover Institution.